1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ink jet recording method and an apparatus, and more particularly to such a recording method and apparatus which are suitable for recording and reproducing a large size pattern.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Many patents have been known which concern ink jet recording method and/or apparatus. One typical apparatus is disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,596,275 to Richard G. Sweet, issued July 27, 1971. As is shown in FIGS. 1 and 12A of the patent, ink droplets 188 are deposited on a record sheet 186 to form a pattern while ink droplets 180 impinge a collector 182 and are recovered thereby. In this recording apparatus, the ink droplets are deflected upwardly and downwardly with respect to a direction of ejection from an ink ejection nozzle 176. In this type of recording apparatus, however, the formation of the ink droplets at a start-up stage is unstable and hence it is difficult to correctly control the deflection, which not only prevents proper pattern recording but also poses a problem of contamination by ejection outside the collector. Accordingly, it is practically advantageous to arrange the collector in the straight flight path of the ink droplets and deflect those ink droplets which are to be used for pattern recording outside a collector area to deposit the droplets onto the record sheet. In such a deflection system, however, the maximum amount of deflection is reduced to one half because the ink droplets can be deflected only in one direction with respect to a straight forward direction of the droplets.